United States v. Bey

The Court affirmed the Defendant's conviction for failure to surrender to serve her sentence for bankruptcy crime on grounds that the attorney-client privilege did not prevent the admission of communications from, or testimony by, her counsel her about her surrender date to prove her knowledge of the surrender date. Following the reasoning and holdings in decisions from the Second, Sixth, Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh Circuits, the Court found that the privilege does not apply to communications about court dates or dates to begin serving a sentence, or testimony about those communications, because communications about public court orders do not comprise confidential legal advice.

Procedural context:

Appeal from conviction by the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois for failing to surrender to prison authorities; issue of scope of attorney-client privilege reviewed de novo.

Facts:

After conviction for false statements in a bankruptcy case, Defendant's attorney sent her a letter stating her surrender date and enclosing a copy of the order setting that surrender date. Defendant did not surrender on that date. Federal agents later arrested her and federal authorities brought charges for knowingly failing to surrender to serve a sentence. At trial, Defendant unsuccessfully attempted to suppress her attorney's letter and objected to testimony by her attorney about that letter on grounds that admission of that evidence violated the attorney-client privilege.